


Trapped in the Closet

by Redrikki



Category: Batwoman (TV 2019)
Genre: Canon Lesbian Character, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:08:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24934294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/pseuds/Redrikki
Summary: Kate was never afraid to come out to her father, but she is now. Episode tag to the season 1 finale.
Relationships: Luke Fox & Mary Hamilton & Kate Kane, Mary Hamilton & Kate Kane
Comments: 6
Kudos: 30
Collections: DCTVGen Pride Month, Hurt/Comfort Bingo - Round 11





	Trapped in the Closet

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [DCTVgenevents](https://dctvgenevents.dreamwidth.org) Pride Month challenge, but also fills my [hurt/comfort bingo card](https://hc-bingo.dreamwidth.org/211156.html?thread=1530580#cmt1530580) square for "witch hunt."

The alcohol wasn’t helping. Funny how drinking a depressant just made Kate more depressed. The three of them had been drinking on her office couch for the better part of an hour and she was starting to feel it like a pounding behind her eyes. Or maybe that was just the beating she’d taken earlier. Kate ground the heels of her hands into her eyes with a groan. Her dad had shaken her hand and then tried to kill her. There was no drinking her way out of that.

“Hey,” Mary squeezed her shoulder. “You okay?”

Kate let her hands drop. The alcohol wasn’t helping, but the company was. Between Alice and her father, it was just such a relief to have one family member left who didn’t want her dead. 

“You know, I was never afraid to come out to my dad.” Kate shook her head. Not everyone could say that. “I was just so sure he’d love me, no matter what.” Not everyone could say that either. 

Mary nodded. “He was so supportive,” she said, almost wistfully. 

He really had been. Kate smiled faintly at the memory. She’d had friends whose parents had yelled or thrown them out. Her dad had just said he’d already known and that he was proud of her for telling him. There was a time when Kate had been furious at Sophie for refusing to tell the world who she really was, but she knew better now. Sophie had been right to be afraid. Even supposedly unconditional love had its limits.

She frowned into the depths of her glass. “Pretty sure he won’t support this,” she said, and drank it down.

Mary hummed in agreement. “You know why I haven’t told Dad about the clinic?”

“Ah, because it’s illegal?” Luke suggested dryly. He’d sat out their first round and was easily the soberest one there. 

“Psh,” Mary scoffed with a gestured that threatened to send her Scotch spilling over the edge of her glass. “The Crows do illegal stuff all the time.”

Like, say, extrajudicial executions? Kate’s lips twisted in a bitter line. She’d known for a while that the Crows weren’t what this city needed, but she’d thought they were better than _that_. Apparently not. What was a little betrayal and attempted murder between friends?

“My illegal stuff helps people, just the wrong people,” Mary said, over enunciating as her drinking caught up to her. “Addicts. The homeless. Everyone the rich pay the Crows to get rid of.”

“You’re undermining him.” And arguably doing more to help the city than all of Dad’s jackbooted thuggery.

“So’s Batwoman,” Luke pointed out, taking a sip.

So was Alice and that was Beth’s real crime, wasn’t it? If it was the killing Dad had a problem with, he wouldn’t have helped Kate dump Cartwright’s body. No, the real problem was that she made him look weak and he couldn’t afford that. Big bad Crow can’t control his own daughter? It wasn’t just about losing face. No one would hire him if they couldn’t trust him to actually protect the city.

Batwoman posed the same problem, just from the opposite direction. Kate had thought she could win him over by showing she could help, but every time she succeeded where the Crows failed she just highlighted how useless he was. He had to kill Batwoman, just to prove he could. There was no way Kate could come out to him now. He would never forgive her.

“I was never in the closet,” Kate said, “not really. Now it feels like I’m trapped in one.”

“A superheroic closet,” Mary said, like that somehow made it better and not just more likely to get her arrested or killed.

“And this time, you’re not alone,” Luke said, clapping her on the shoulder. 

“Yeah, you’ve got us now, plus your super-spy ex and random teenage hacker friend,” Mary said.

Kate couldn’t help but smile. The alcohol was not helping, but that? Knowing she wasn’t alone and that her friends had her back? That kind of did.


End file.
